Another example of the kind of technology the SysAdmin mission requires, this time from the MITRE Corporation.

LocalEyes is an easy-to-use, low-cost cell phone application. It allows citizens in communities throughout the world to report criminal and terrorist activities without revealing their identities. Citizens can also use it to send data reports to authorities on public safety issues such as missing manhole covers, new pot holes, gas leaks, breaks in dams, and downed power lines.

Note the implicit recognition that disaster response missions, stabilization missions and COIN missions share the need to empower the population to securely share information. In this case, cell phones are used to aggregate information.

LocalEyes is a machine-to-machine data-driven system, so it doesn’t need language translation. A citizen need only push a few buttons to send data about the “what,” “where,” and “when” of a sighting to a collection database. For example, if the sighting is a cache of AK-47 rifles, the citizen turns on LocalEyes and selects an image that’s an exact match or is similar to an AK-47, and types in the location. Photos and text can be added to the report as attachments. The citizen now pushes a button to send the LocalEyes report, along with a time stamp, to the collection database.

The elegance of this approach stems from its use of existing cell infrastructure (meaning that it doesn’t have to wait for further infrastructure investment), and the ability to tailor it to different cultures.

LocalEyes can be set up by just about anyone in any culture. The local administrator just creates a checklist of things he or she wants LocalEyes to do. For example, to allow people to attach photos, a check mark is placed next to that option on the configuration list. Images and text that fit with the local culture are selected by the administrator. When the location-based version of LocalEyes is completed, it can be automatically pushed out to the cell phone users.

Of course, in order to know which images and text fit the local culture, one would need to have a deep understanding of that culture… leading us back to the role of anthropologists (a topic Mark recently discussed and I’ve posted on in the past).

As examples of SysAdmin investments accumulate, the distinction between them and legacy Leviathan investments becomes clearer. This disrupts the gravy train of massive, decade-long procurement programs that have become the big contractors’ specialty. Keep your eyes out for the shifting responses as this disruption grows.

The Sunday Times ran a story yesterday stating that Brigadier General Ali Reza Asgari had been spying for the West since 2003 before defecting last month.

This story has been on my radar since last week, thanks to the Belmont Club’s post.

Given Asgari’s long ties to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, as well as his service as an aide to the Iranian defense minister, the prospect of what he could be revealing to Western intelligence must be causing some serious hearburn in Iran.